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Klaus Dodds

The Antarctic continent was the last to be discovered by humans, despite the fact that its presence had been postulated much earlier. The Antarctic is now a symbol of global anxiety as well ...
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The Antarctic continent was the last to be discovered by humans, despite the fact that its presence had been postulated much earlier. The Antarctic is now a symbol of global anxiety as well as being a site of scientific collaboration and knowledge exchange. ‘Defining the Antarctic’ looks at where the Antarctic is, what it consists of, what lives there, and its huge geographical variation. The Antarctic is the area, according to geographical convention, containing everything below the Antarctic Circle, including ice shelves and water. Antarctica is the landmass itself, is the southern polar continent. The Antarctic is very distinct from the Arctic in terms of economy, politics, and biology. ...Less

Alan Taylor

From 1689 to 1763, four huge imperial wars were waged between the French and the British. ‘Empires’ looks at the battle for territory that raged at the end of one century and into the next ...
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From 1689 to 1763, four huge imperial wars were waged between the French and the British. ‘Empires’ looks at the battle for territory that raged at the end of one century and into the next and examines the impact of this on all involved and the ramifications afterwards. British success threatened the native peoples of the interior, as they had been playing off the rival empires against one another to keep their own autonomy. They prepared for war. The brutal war that followed hardened animosities along racial lines. The frontier war was frustrating and expensive for the British, leading to bitter disputes between the colonists and the British over money. This provoked the crisis that lost most of that empire. ...Less

The first Asians—Filipino “Luzon Indians” on a Spanish galleon—arrived on the North American continent in the late sixteenth century. Through periods of conquest and capitalism, and then ...
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The first Asians—Filipino “Luzon Indians” on a Spanish galleon—arrived on the North American continent in the late sixteenth century. Through periods of conquest and capitalism, and then colonization and adaptation, almost one million people from China, Japan, the Philippines, Korea, and India arrived seeking opportunities to better their fortunes and improve their lives. “Empires and migration,” outlines the key historical periods that facilitated this mobilization. It also explains that Asian immigration challenged the United States’ constitutional claims of equality for all, highlighting the question of which racial groups could claim citizenship, triggering America’s first attempts to systematically control its borders and limit the rights of immigrants and visitors. ...Less

Madeline Y. Hsu

Asians have migrated to North America for centuries, in search of opportunities and conveyed by increasingly dense, international circuits of trade, labor markets, and family networks. ...
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Asians have migrated to North America for centuries, in search of opportunities and conveyed by increasingly dense, international circuits of trade, labor markets, and family networks. Asians joined a diverse array of immigrants arriving in capacities as diverse merchants, farmers, soldiers, missionaries, soldiers, artists, and students. They contributed significantly to the massive transformation of the United States into the wealthiest and most powerful nation in the world, particularly on the west coast and Hawaii. Asian American History: A Very Short Introduction highlights how Asian immigration has shaped the evolution of ideological and legal interpretations of America as a “nation of immigrants.” ...Less

Klaus Dodds

Antarctic: A Very Short Introduction provides a modern account of Antarctica, highlighting the main issues facing the continent today, looks at how the Antarctic has been ...
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Antarctic: A Very Short Introduction provides a modern account of Antarctica, highlighting the main issues facing the continent today, looks at how the Antarctic has been explored and represented, and considers the main exploratory and scientific achievements of the region. How has globalization impacted on the Antarctic's current and future status? The Antarctic is one the most hostile natural environments in the world. It is an extraordinary physical space, which changes significantly in shape and size with the passing of the seasons. Politically, it is interesting as it contains one of the few areas of continental space not claimed by any nation-state. Scientifically, the continental ice sheet has provided us with vital evidence about the Earth's past climate. ...Less

Klaus Dodds

The Antarctic is a ‘science laboratory’ with emphasis given to controlled and ordered knowledge creation and international behaviour. ‘Doing Antarctic science’ looks at how science has been ...
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The Antarctic is a ‘science laboratory’ with emphasis given to controlled and ordered knowledge creation and international behaviour. ‘Doing Antarctic science’ looks at how science has been conducted in the region in the past and now. Antarctic science is multi-disciplinary and collaborative, often involving many players. With the help of bodies such as the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR), scientists have generated some important insights into the Antarctic. The future of the Antarctic remains uncertain but it may involve a combination of decreased sea ice extent, loss of ice from the West Antarctic ice sheet, retreating glaciers, and changings ecosystem dynamics due to ocean acidification and global warming. ...Less

Klaus Dodds

Antarctic discovery and exploration are profoundly gendered, racialized, nationalized, and civilized. ‘Discovering the Antarctic’ looks at initial exploration and discovery in the Antarctic ...
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Antarctic discovery and exploration are profoundly gendered, racialized, nationalized, and civilized. ‘Discovering the Antarctic’ looks at initial exploration and discovery in the Antarctic and the history of exploration in the region. The history of Antarctic discovery and exploration is mostly one of gradual coastal encounters and more expansive continental and subterranean exploration. The Antarctic continues to surprise. There is a darker side to the history of Antarctic discovery and the tendency to focus on the heroic past has consequences. We don't hear much about the way in which discovery and polar heritage helps vested interests. Rather, histories of discovery are commercially, political, and intellectually exploited. ...Less

Stewart A. Weaver

‘Epilogue: Final frontiers?’ considers undersea and space exploration. Jacques-Yves Cousteau claimed the oceans were the last frontier of our planet. The Cold War race to the moon took ...
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‘Epilogue: Final frontiers?’ considers undersea and space exploration. Jacques-Yves Cousteau claimed the oceans were the last frontier of our planet. The Cold War race to the moon took exploration into space. Are these the final frontiers? For all the different forms it takes in different historical periods, for all the worthy and unworthy motives that lie behind it, exploration—travel for the sake of discovery and adventure—seems to be a human compulsion, a human obsession even; it is a defining element of a distinctly human identity, and it will never rest at any frontier, whether terrestrial or extraterrestrial. ...Less

Stewart A. Weaver

‘What is (and is not) exploration?’ discusses what it means to explore and be an explorer by considering explorations and discoveries through history by Leif Eiriksson, Christopher ...
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‘What is (and is not) exploration?’ discusses what it means to explore and be an explorer by considering explorations and discoveries through history by Leif Eiriksson, Christopher Columbus, Meriwether Lewis, William Clark, Alexander von Humboldt, Henry Morton Stanley, Richard Burton, John Hanning Speke, David Livingstone, and James Cook. Exploration is often fundamentally about mediation, intercession, cultural negotiation, and sometimes, even, symbiosis. Exploration also encouraged some form of occupation, conquest, or control. Explorers were the primary agents of contact not just between cultures and peoples, but between whole ecosystems and environments. To that joint anthropological and ecological extent, exploration ultimately means change: it is a particularly adventurous form of original travel involving discovery, cultural contact, and change. ...Less

Stephen Howe

‘Empire by sea’ traces the rise of the ‘long-distance’ overseas imperialisms of the Western European powers and explores the economic effects of empire. Some argue that African, Asian, and ...
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‘Empire by sea’ traces the rise of the ‘long-distance’ overseas imperialisms of the Western European powers and explores the economic effects of empire. Some argue that African, Asian, and other precolonial economies possessed all the preconditions for future commercial and industrial dynamism, and that colonial rule destroyed these, blocking the possibility of their emerging elsewhere. Others argue that, on the contrary, colonialism played an economically progressive role, being the means by which European technology, culture, and institutions — the things which had enabled Europe itself to develop and industrialize — were spread across the rest of the world. ...Less

Ashley Jackson

‘Engines of Expansion’ explores the impulses that led people overseas and engage in activities that drove imperial expansion. These forces included migration, trade, strategic rivalry, and ...
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‘Engines of Expansion’ explores the impulses that led people overseas and engage in activities that drove imperial expansion. These forces included migration, trade, strategic rivalry, and wars. The expansion and contraction of the British Empire reflected Britain's relative strength vis-à-vis its rival powers. Much of the expansion was as a result of unintended consequences and was not planned or necessarily strategic. But individuals, governments, and organisations all played a part in shaping the Empire. Settlement and migration often brought with it a version of British society and culture that was shaped by the culture into which it was transplanted. ...Less

Stewart A. Weaver

‘Exploration and the Enlightenment ’ considers a “Second Great Age of Discovery” that came about during the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. It began with the 1735 Geodesic Mission to the ...
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‘Exploration and the Enlightenment ’ considers a “Second Great Age of Discovery” that came about during the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. It began with the 1735 Geodesic Mission to the Equator, designed to ascertain the true figure of the Earth. Never before had so large and learned a group of Europeans headed into the remote interior of the New World for an expressly scientific purpose or the results of an expedition been so elaborately publicized in maps, journals, and official reports back home. This trip is seen as the prototype of the modern exploring expedition. The voyages of Captain James Cook in the Pacific Ocean and Alexander von Humboldt's trip to South America provide further examples of Enlightenment exploration. ...Less

Stewart A. Weaver

For as long as there have been civilizations, there has been the urge to venture outside of them, either in search of other civilizations or in search of novelty. But what accounts for this ...
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For as long as there have been civilizations, there has been the urge to venture outside of them, either in search of other civilizations or in search of novelty. But what accounts for this exploration urge? Exploration: A Very Short Introduction surveys this quintessential human impulse, tracing it from pre-history to the present, from east to west around the globe, and from the depths of volcanoes to the expanses of space. It arranges the history of world explorations into thematic chapters, each of which isolates the distinctive qualities and characteristics of exploration in a particular era, period, or place. ...Less